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Image courtesy of Bulbapedia

This
story started with a Golbat TCG card (though accounts of an Alakazam
card with a similar story also exists) that had what appeared to be a swastika
in the
background. This immediately set off red flags
with parents who became convinced that the show was promoting Nazism.

Is there a
connection between Pocket Monsters
and the Third Reich? Or are parents, once again, overreacting?

The symbol seen
on the card was indeed a
swastika, but it's important to have a little history on the symbol
before jumping to any conclusions. The symbol presented in the
Japanese card was the left-facing manji,
used in most Buddhist nations to represent
love and mercy. The reason for the symbol's inclusion on the card
is unknown, but it should be noted that this commonly used Buddhist
symbol is not taboo in Asian countries since it's more strongly tied to
Buddhism than it is to Nazism.

The image on the
American version of the card, like
the images on many of the TCG cards, was mirrored for release in
America. Flipping Japanese artwork was actually a common practice
at the time; manga series that were released in the States, for
example, also had
their artwork flipped to make them more accessible to Western
audiences. Because of this mirror image, the left-facing manji became a right-facing
swastika, which actually is
strongly tied to Adolf Hitler.

While the inclusion
of a Buddhist symbol on a children's trading card does seem odd and the
fact that the mirrored swastika wasn't edited out before the card went
to press in the United States is baffling, the idea that Pocket Monsters is somehow trying
to promote Nazism is absurd. If anything, this story is a sign of
cultural misunderstandings that have, unfortunately, resulted in some
bad publicity for the franchise.